Canada's Ruck wins 200-yard freestyle at NCAA championships; transgender swimmer Thomas finishes 5th

Two-time Canadian Olympian Taylor Ruck won her first individual NCAA swimming title for Stanford on Friday, leading wire-to-wire in the 200-yard freestyle with a time of 1:41.12 at the NCAA Division I women's swimming and diving championships in Atlanta.

Ruck won two bronze medals at the Rio Olympics in 2016 before adding another bronze and a silver last summer at the Tokyo Games.

Top-seed Lia Thomas of Penn tied for fifth. She became the first known transgender woman to win an NCAA swimming championship with a victory in the 500 freestyle on Thursday.

Virginia sophomore Alex Walsh and junior Kate Douglass each won an individual title on Friday to help the Cavaliers build on their commanding lead at the championships.

Virginia, going for its second straight national title, has 386.5 points — 110.5 ahead of second-place Stanford. Texas is third with 257.

Walsh cruised to the win in the 400-yard medley with a personal best time of 3:57.25 as Virginia picked up 54 points in the event with junior Ella Nelson third and freshman Emma Weyant fourth. It was Walsh's second individual title of the meet.

The Virginia relay group of Gretchen Walsh, Alexis Wenger, Alex Walsh and Douglass capped the Friday events by winning the 400-yard medley relay in 3:22.34 to tie their own NCAA record set at the ACC championships.

Southern Cal's Kaitlyn Dobler edged Wenger by just .04 seconds to claim the 100-yard breaststroke title after finishing second in the event last year.

North Carolina State's Katharine Berkoff successfully defended her title in 100-yard backstroke with an American record of 48.74. Walsh swam under the previous American record to finish second in 49.00.

Defending champion Sarah Bacon of Minnesota won her fifth career NCAA championship in 3-meter diving.